


tell 'em who's in charge (so they don't forget)

by consumptive_sphinx



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Character Study, Child Abuse, Child Neglect, Denial of Feelings, F/F, F/M, Multi, Other, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-09-17
Packaged: 2020-10-20 12:08:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20675135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/consumptive_sphinx/pseuds/consumptive_sphinx
Summary: Love's not real. Uma knows that deep as she knows anything; the Auradonians on the broken TV in the restaurant like to say every parent loves their child but if that weren't the biggest lie Uma's ever been told she'd have had more than awork harder, you lazy bitchher whole life, would have had a sea witch standing behind her helping her keep her borders hers. Only difference is she knows that, and doesn't wish for it like Harry or Gil does.Uma doesn't have wishes. She hasplans.





	tell 'em who's in charge (so they don't forget)

Uma knows a lot of things, and the first of them is: if she wants something, she's gonna have to get it her own damn self. She's never had someone else keeping her borders hers, never had a fairy with a reputation standing behind her — everything she's earned she earned on her own first and don't you fucking forget it. 

It's not like it's hard to remember. She makes it pretty damn clear.  _ What's my name, _ she snaps, and Harry whispers  _ Uma,  _ no  _ daughter of  _ attached, not like that spoiled fucking pixie bitch who named herself after her own mom and  _ still  _ adds  _ daughter of Maleficent  _ to her name, like they'll all forget to worship her damn feet if she doesn't remind them whose daughter exactly she is — Uma doesn't need any of that shit. You know who she is already. 

That bitch in princess's clothing is in Auradon now, sitting pretty under a fake tiara while the king feeds her strawberries, and now this is Uma's time, she's been  _ up next  _ for as long as she can remember, and — 

— Uma is eight years old which is old enough to balance four plates of food if she's careful and tall enough to reach the deep fryer if she stands on a chair, and so she starts working in Ursula's restaurant. 

The work is hard and the people are assholes and Uma's a hard worker, always has been, and her mom barely seems to notice except to yell at her for not being a harder one. She's young enough then that it sinks in instead of rolling off and she works  _ harder,  _ which means when Mal declares herself a girl and names herself after her own mom and gets together with Jay Jafar's son and takes over half the Isle with Maleficent standing right behind her to make sure nobody steals her little girl's territory Uma isn't  _ there.  _

Ursula doesn't care, obviously, Ursula doesn't give a shit about anything but making sure Uma's home in time to work the night shift, but Uma's a hard worker. If she works hard enough someday her mom might notice it, but — 

— Uma is thirteen and the worst thing she's ever been called is  _ shrimp _ . Not bitch not lazy not sodomitical degenerate tempter (whatever the fuck that even means) but  _ shrimp, too weak to hold a border, too weak to hold a crew,  _ and she isn't weak she isn't she isn't she ISN'T — 

— Gil is seventeen and Harry is fifteen and Uma is sixteen, the year that magic happens in the stories the Auradonians like to tell, and the Auradonians open the gates and they let four people out and the four they choose are Mal’s gang, because of fucking course they are, that spoiled pixie bitch gets everything she ever asked for and half the things she didn’t, and Mal has the chance to get everything right for all of them and she  _ doesn’t take it  _ and the king on his fucking throne promises he’s going to get all the rest of them off this hellhole of an island and he  _ doesn’t,  _ and that’s when Uma decides she’s going to steal the wand herself, because if you want anything you have to get it your own damn self, nobody’s ever handed Uma anything on a platter not freedom not food not pretty dresses and princess crowns and nobody ever will — 

— Uma is ten when she finds Edward Hook's kid hiding behind the restaurant. 

"Harriet?" she says, because she can't think what else to say. 

_ "Harry," _ he snarls, and she only rolls her eyes a little bit at the vehemence before she says, 

"Harry, then. Finish night shift with me and I'll give you some of the leftovers," and Uma doesn't bother to look back to see whether he follows her inside because she can hear him, half a step step behind her and a little bit to her right. 

Uma's gang doesn't so much have people in it but she lets herself wonder for a moment that night if that's where her second in command would stand if she had one, wonders if that's how Jay Jafar's son stands behind Mal, and — 

— "My dad loves me," Harry insists, even now that he's fourteen and Uma's fifteen and they should really have outgrown things like this by now, even now that he lives with Uma and his dad barely even looks at him anymore. 

Uma could say any number of things about Harry's dad but what she says instead is "Love's not real," in the tone of voice that would come with an eye roll but without actually rolling her eyes, and relaxes into Gil's hands as he braids her braids into bigger braids. 

Love's not real. Uma knows that deep as she knows anything; the Auradonians on the broken TV in the restaurant like to say every parent loves their child but if that weren't the biggest lie Uma's ever been told she'd have had more than a  _ work harder, you lazy bitch  _ her whole life, would have had a sea witch standing behind her helping her keep her borders hers. Only difference is she knows that, and doesn't wish for it like Harry or Gil does. 

Uma doesn't have wishes, she has  _ plans,  _ and — 

— Uma is twelve and Harry is eleven when they find Gil son of Gaston crying over a dead rat. 

There's a reason you don't cry on the Isle and a reason Uma hasn't cried since she was six but Gil's big and two people isn't a very big gang even if the two people in question  _ are _ Uma and Harry. So she nudges Harry forward to talk to him and stands back, because gang leaders can't be comforting randoms about their dead rats. 

Gil, it turns out, keeps rats. It's the dumbest thing of a lot of dumbass things Uma's heard but Gil's pretty dumb as a person so that checks out. 

Gaston, it turns out, kills Gil's rats when he finds them, and tells Gil to be a man about it when he cries. 

Gil's big and Gil's strong and Gil would cry again if he really hurt someone but having him there will keep the fights away, won't it, and then Uma won't have to patch up so many of Harry's knife wounds. "Wanna be part of my crew?" she offers, for that reason and absolutely no other, and Gil looks at her with shining still-wet eyes until Uma cuts the eye contact because clearly he doesn't know when to do it, and — 

— Uma is seventeen and Gil is eighteen and Harry is sixteen and Mal’s dyed-blonde fucking face is on the broken TV screen, in a sparkly dress with a fake tiara and getting fed strawberries by the king while Uma works her ass off to keep what that spoiled fucking bitch left behind. 

King Ben talks about love, and Uma scoffs and lets herself relax into Gil's hands as he braids her braids into bigger braids, and Harry curls up with his head in her lap, and somewhere in this pile there's one of Gil's rats but fuck if Uma knows where, and — 

— love's not real. Uma knows that deeper than she knows anything. But this is nice. 


End file.
